Ex-Iraq PM Allawi leads vote in oil-rich Kirkuk

Iraqiya garnered 123,862 votes, while the Kurdistania alliance was second with 120,664 votes so far with 61 percent of ballots counted.

Former premier Iyad Allawi's secular Iraqiya bloc was unexpectedly leading in the disputed oil-rich province of Kirkuk, early results from Iraq's March 7 general election showed on Sunday.

Iraqiya garnered 123,862 votes, while the Kurdistania alliance, which had been expected to come out on top in the northern province, was second with 120,664 votes so far with 61 percent of ballots counted.

Kurdistania is comprised of regional president Massud Barzani's Kurdistan Democratic Party and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan of Iraqi President Jalal Talabani.

Lagging back in third was Goran ("Change" in Kurdish) with 20,152 votes.

Kirkuk accounts for 13 parliamentary seats in the 325-member Council of Representatives.

The province is at the centre of a land dispute between the central government in Baghdad and Kurdish authorities in Arbil.

Kurdish leaders want their autonomous region, which currently consists of three distinct provinces, to be expanded into historically Kurdish-inhabited parts of Nineveh and Diyala as well as all of Kirkuk.

The central government in Baghdad, however, says the Kurdish region's borders should not extend past its existing provinces of Arbil, Sulaimaniyah and Dohuk.

Complete results from the Iraqi election are expected on March 18 and the final ones -- after any appeals are dealt with -- will probably come at the end of the month.